If you use this list as a guide and then set up some other email addresses that make sense for your specific business, you might think you’re all set.

But don’t forget to do one more thing to make sure you don’t miss any messages from customers or potential customers trying to contact you: make sure your Catchall Mailbox is enabled.

A catchall mailbox is one email inbox that is designated to receive all the email sent to your domain for which there isn’t an active mailbox. It catches all the mis-addressed email sent to your domain that would otherwise bounce back to senders.

Is that really necessary? Yes!

Here’s an example: you may have set up help@yourdomain.com to handle all customer support questions, but some people may try emailing support@yourdomain.com instead. Or you may have set up jon@yourdomain.com (because your name is Jon) but people may send to john@yourdomain.com because they don’t know how you spell your name.

Whatever the reason, people will send email to addresses at your domain that don’t exist. With your catchall enabled…you’ll catch them all.

For EarthLink Web Hosting customers, your catcall will be postmaster@yourdomain.com.

How to Enable Your Catchall Mailbox:

1. Log in to your Web Hosting Control Panel at control.earthlink.net.
2. Click Email in the top navigation.
3. Click the icon labeled Catchall Mailbox.
4. Click to change the catchall status from Disable to Enable.
5. Click the Save button (you’ll see a confirmation that the address was enabled).

That’s all there is to activate your catchall, but you may wish to make a couple of changes to this mailbox.

In the Accounts section on the left side of the Email Control Panel page, next to postmaster, click the edit account icon (looks like a paper & pencil) to make your changes.

First, you can change the email password for postmaster@yourdomain.com.

Second, you can enable forwarding to another email address. Many people like to forward catchall mail to another address they check regularly, so they don’t miss anything.

How to Forward Your Catchall Mail:

1. Click the Yes radio button next to Forwarding: Enabled.
2. In the Forward to box, list up to 10 email addresses, separated by commas.
3. Click the Update Forwarding button.

That’s it.

Now, if only there were a way to respond to all those messages automatically.